Ever had a difficult decision to make and, instead of trusting your instincts, you analyzed, contemplated, researched and pondered until you felt so paralyzed with uncertainty and doubt that you couldn’t take any action at all?

Instead of choosing to remain stuck and live as a victim of circumstance, consider embracing the power of loving yourself unconditionally. Identify your fears, respect them, demonstrate compassion for what you are feeling and express gratitude for the opportunity at hand.

When you fall in love with yourself, everything else falls into place, personally and professionally. Choosing love as your core energy automatically enhances every aspect of your life: your perceptions, opportunities, relationships and priorities. You get unstuck, reclaim your personal power and recapture your zest for living, moving yourself forward into a life you love. When love transforms your relationship with yourself, it transforms your personal life, your work and the world.

Making this set of simple personalized practices a way of life helps you stay centered in a life of generous, effortless, gracious flow filled with faith, hope, prosperity, peace and joy. And when you drift off center occasionally, as any of us can do when overwhelmed by stress and gripped by ancient self-destructive scripts, these tools are the key to recognizing it quickly and getting back on track easily.

Pay Attention: If you don’t recognize you’re feeling stressed, you can’t change it. Practice mindfulness by noticing what you are thinking, feeling, saying, and doing and figuring out why.

Breathe: Next time things start getting a little crazy, stop, take three deep breaths, become fully present, restore sanity, and realize you have options. Your brain needs oxygen to function effectively. Try setting a timer on your phone or computer to remind you periodically to stop, close your eyes for a minute, and just breathe.

Be Here Now: Forget rehashing the past and agonizing over the future. This moment is your only real opportunity to make a difference. Just you, just here, just now, just be. Perpetual equanimity and fulfillment come from dancing in the moment.

Opportunity Knocks: While life won’t always follow your plans and expectations, everything in life is an opportunity. An opportunity to understand yourself better, open your heart wider, and develop greater compassion for yourself and others. While the details of our lives differ, we all experience the same range of emotions, from fear, frustration, and loneliness to joy, contentment, and peace. With yourself firmly planted in the present moment, it is your ability to respond creatively and constructively that makes the difference.

Get Curious: If everything is an opportunity, where might the opportunity be in this situation? The Universe is far more creative than we can imagine. Assume the best and look for the silver lining in even the darkest cloud.

Talk to Yourself: It is the smartest crazy thing you’ll ever do. It improves your sense of perspective, creativity, and humor. You might discover that what you were dreading isn’t likely to happen or will be much easier than you feared. With a little imagination, it might even be a great opportunity. This tool is particularly effective for constructively engaging, understanding, and motivating your sage, guardian, and muse.

Write It Down: Getting stressful thoughts out of your head and onto paper can also improve your sense of perspective. Often, just putting them in writing reduces them to a more manageable size.

Move It: When in doubt, move about. A gentle walk around the room, the block, or the gym will begin releasing natural tranquilizers and restoring full breathing. It feeds your creativity so you will be able to come up with more resourceful options for handling your situation.

Hydrate: Water fosters flow and sustains life. It composes up to 60 percent of the average human body and covers 70 percent of the earth’s surface. Drink. Shower. Bathe. Swim. Cry. Hydrate yourself in every way imaginable and watch yourself flow through the ups and downs of life with greater flexibility, creativity, and resilience.

Trust Your Gut: You have inside you all the wisdom you seek. Instead of stressing yourself out by fighting your instincts or feeling compelled to justify your hunches with logic, try trusting your intuition instead.

Behave As If: There are two aspects to this one: If you gave yourself the same care and attention you give your friends and loved ones, what support would you give yourself right now? And what would you dare to do if you believed you couldn’t fail?

Take Baby Steps: Slow and steady produces meaningful, lasting results. Vast forced output is rarely sustained. Great strides of lasting value involve myriad baby steps over time. If the conceivers of the Taj Mahal had believed fast was the only way to get there, it would have crumbled in the first storm. Your dreams are the same. Don’t try to take them all on at once. Identify the next small step and take it. Then another and another and another. Before you know it, you will have built your dream, and it will last your whole life through.

Celebrate: Every step forward is a cause for celebration. Every time you move closer to your dreams, pat yourself on the back with a party moment. Ta-da! A steady stream of self-affirmation will continue releasing additional positive fuel to keep you moving forward.

Time for What Matters: Time is not a scarce resource. You have all the time you need for the things that matter. Your sole responsibility in each moment is to discern what matters most right now, to focus, and to follow through. Using the other tools will help clear the way to accessing your deepest wisdom and moving forward, in each moment, with confidence, peace, and joy.

What baby step will you take today to embrace change and turn unexplored possibilities into fulfilling realities? You’ve got nothing to lose, except the limits fear, stress and pain have been placing on your life. Time to reclaim your power and step into your greatness!

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About djwlifecoach

As a board-certified coach, author and Reiki master teacher, I share hope, possibilities and empowerment with the world. What's love got to do with minimizing stress and getting unstuck? Everything! My book, "Choose Your Energy: Change Your Life!" (Hay House/Balboa Press 2013) shares my story and the stories of 10 of my clients along with my signature Discovery Framework.
During my 30 years as an organization transformation consultant, I served as a senior partner in four of the world's largest, most prestigious global professional services firms. In 2005, I took a five-year sabbatical to find healing and peace because non-stop work had taken its toll. My recovery from burnout, including a sustained 80-pound weight loss and freedom from 10 years of debilitating depression, led to finding my purpose sharing hope, possibilities and empowerment with the world.
Through healing and self-exploration, I discovered that loving yourself unconditionally is the key to transforming your personal life, your work and the world. With attention and intention, I learned to live in alignment with love through a wealth of energy-shifting tools and techniques that help me reduce stress, anxiety and overwhelm by releasing limiting beliefs, emotions and habits.
My books, blog, radio show and signature coaching programs help individuals and organizations harness the transformative energy of love to turn unexplored possibilities into fulfilling realities and step into their greatness. To learn more about my work in the world, visit djwlifecoach.com. Subscribe to my blog at tiny.cc/djwblog. Listen to my radio show at tiny.cc/djwradio. View my author video and book trailer at tiny.cc/djwauthorvideo and tiny.cc/djwbooktrailer. Access 40+ tapping resources at tiny.cc/djwtaps. Send email to deborah@djwlifecoach.com.
For fun, I love singing, reading, sewing, knitting, golfing and movies. I live in Williamsburg, Virginia with my husband, Wilson, and the coaching cats who manage my life—SiddhaLee and Maisy Jane.